1876 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
19 
I set them on dummies. On the third day I put 
two chicks a day old to one of the hens. She 
pecked at them once or twice, seemed rather fidgety, 
then took to them, called them to her, and entered 
on all the cares of a mother. The other hen was 
similarly tried, but with a very different result. She 
pecked at the chickens viciously, and both that day 
and the next stubbornly refused to have anything 
to do with them.” 
Mr. Romanes takes up the investigation, and the 
following accounts are condensed from his narra¬ 
tive. Spanish hens, it seems, will rarely set at all, 
hut one of his “sat on dummies for three days, 
after which her patience was exhausted. However, 
she seemed to think that the self-sacrifice she had 
undergone merited some reward; for, on leaving 
the nest, she turned foster-mother to all the. Span¬ 
ish chickens in the yard. It is now four weeks 
since this adoption took place, but the mother as 
yet shows no signs of wishing to cast off her hete¬ 
rogeneous brood, notwithstanding some of her 
adopted chickens have grown nearly as large as 
herself.” But the best story is told of an old Brah¬ 
ma hen, of much experience, to whom Mr. Romanes 
gave a pea-fowl’s egg to hatch. This would not 
only require a week longer than an ordinary chick, 
which almost any hen gives into with a brood of 
ducklings, but the pea-chick has to be cared for 
much longer than the common chicken, and the 
object was to see how the instinct, or whatever it 
be, would deal with the peculiar state of things. 
“ The result was very surprising, for the enor¬ 
mous period of 18 months this old Brahma hen 
remained with her ever-growing chicken, and 
throughout the whole of that period she continued 
to pay it unremitting attention. She never laid 
any eggs during this lengthened period of maternal 
supervision, and if at any time she became acci¬ 
dentally separated from her charge, the distress of 
both mother and chicken was very great. The ab¬ 
normal degree of pride which the mother showed in 
her wonderful chicken was most ludicrous, but I 
have no space to enter into details. It may be 
stated, however, that both before and after the 
separation, the mother was in the habit of fre¬ 
quently combing out the top-knot of her son, she 
standing on a seat or other eminence of suitable 
height, and he bending his head forward with evi¬ 
dent satisfaction. This fact is particularly note¬ 
worthy, because the practice of combing out the 
top-knot of their chickens is customary among pea¬ 
hens.” Did the son teach his mother how to do 
it ? It should be added that a repetition of the ex¬ 
periment the next year with another Brahma was a 
dead failure, for she deserted her family at the time 
When it is natural for ordinary hens to do so, and 
in consequence the brood of pea-chickens perished. 
There is a queer story about some orphan 
young ferrets placed under a sitting Brahma hen, 
who took good care of them, combing out their 
hair with her bill just as hens generally comb out 
the feathers of their chickens, frequently stopping, 
however, “ to look with one eye at the wriggling 
nest-full with an inquiring gaze expressive of aston¬ 
ishment.” We share the old hen’s feeling as we 
read the narrative. 
A Convenient Ice-Hook. 
A very handy ice-hook may be made as shown in 
the annexed engraving. The handle is firmly 
fastened and keyed 
into a socket, at the 
end of which are two 
sharply pointed 
spikes, one of which 
serves to push pieces 
of ice, and the other 
to draw them to the 
shore, or out of the 
water, to be loaded 
and removed. It may 
be made of light iron, 
horse-shoe bar will be heavy enough, and there 
is no need to have the points steeled ; it will be 
sufficient if they are chilled, aftei* they are sharpen¬ 
ed, in salt and ice pounded together. 
How to Extricate a Mired Animal, 
An animal mired in a swamp gets into a worse 
predicament the longer it struggles. The effort to 
extricate it should be made in an effective manner, 
so that the animal may not be encouraged to ex¬ 
haust itself in repeated exertions, which are useless, 
and only sink it deeper in the mire. The usual 
method is to fasten a rope around the animal’s 
horns or neck, and while this is pulled by some of 
the assistants, others place rails beneath the body 
of the animal for the purpose of lifting it out of 
the hole. This plan is sometimes effective, but it 
often is not, and at best it is a slow, clumsy, and 
laborious method. The materials needed for the 
method here referred to are all that are required for 
a much better one, which is illustrated in the 
engraving given on page 17. This is very sim¬ 
ple, and two men can operate it, and at a pinch, 
even one man alone may succeed with it. A strong 
stake or an iron bar is driven into the solid ground 
at a distance of 25 feet or more from the mired ani¬ 
mal. Two short rails, about 9 feet long, are tied 
together near the ends, so that they can be spread 
apart in the form of a pair of shears, for hoisting. 
A long rope is fastened around the horns or neck 
of the animal, with such a knot that the loop cannot 
be drawn tight enough to do any injury. The rope 
is cast over the ends of the rails as they are set up 
upon the edge of the solid ground, and carried to 
the stake or crow-bar beyond. The end of the rope 
is fastened to a stout hand-spike, leaving about a 
foot of the end of it free. This end is laid against 
the bar or stake, and the other end is moved around 
it so that the rope is wound upon it, drawing it up 
and with it drawing the animal out of the mire. 
The rope being held up by the tied rails, tends to 
lift the animal and make its extrication very easy. 
— H m - 
How to get rid of Straw. 
Many farmers in “ the west,” and some in what 
we call “the east,” are troubled as to what they 
shall do with the piles of straw which lie about their 
fields. Upon the same farms with these nearly use¬ 
less straw piles, many head of stock are kept, and 
many more might be kept, which could be made 
useful in reducing the 6traw to a condition in which 
it would serve as manure. If the already urgent 
necessity for manure upon the western and south¬ 
ern fields were realized, there would be little hesi¬ 
tation in taking measures to remove the difficulty. 
The chief obstacle is, that these involve either per¬ 
sonal or hired labor; the first is objectionable to 
many, and the second cannot be had for want of 
the money necessary to pay for it. The least labo¬ 
rious method of using this straw and making it 
serve the double purpose of a shelter for stock, and 
a fertilizer for the field upon which it has been 
grown, is illustrated in the engraving on next 
page. Some poles are set in the ground, and 
rails or other poles are laid upon them so as to form 
a sloping roof. This is made near or around the 
place chosen for thrashing the grain. The straw 
from the thrashing machine is heaped upon the 
rails, making a long stack, which forms three sides 
of a square, with the open side towards the south, 
and leaving a space beneath it in which cattle may 
be sheltered from storms. In this enclosure some 
rough troughs or racks may be placed, from which 
to feed corn. Here the cattle will feed and lie, or 
will lie at nights under shelter, while feeding dur¬ 
ing the day upon corn in the field. As the straw 
that is given them becomes trampled and mixed 
with the droppings, a further supply is thrown 
down from the stack. The accumulation may be 
removed and spread upon the field to be plowed in 
when it is so required, and the stakes pulled up 
and carried to another place, where they may be 
needed for the same purpose. Such a shelter as 
as this would be very serviceable for the purpose 
of making manure, even where straw is scarce, as 
in parts of the southern states. There pine boughs 
may be made to serve as a covering, and leaves, pine 
straw, dry pond muck, swamp muck, “trash” 
from cotton fields, corn stalks, or pea vines, and 
any other such materials may be gathered and 
thrown from time to time beneath the cattle. Cot¬ 
ton seed meal, straw, and coarse hay, would keep 
stock in excellent order, and although there may 
be little snow or ice during the winter months in 
those states, yet the animals will be very much bet¬ 
ter for even this rude but comfortable shelter. In 
many other places such a temporary arrangement 
will be found useful in saving the hauling of straw, 
stalks, or hay, from distant fields, and the carting 
of manure back again to them. It will be found 
vastly easier to keep a few young cattle in such a 
field, and go thither daily to attend to them during 
the winter when work is not pressing, than to haul 
many loads of hay or straw to the barn at harvest 
time, or to haul many loads of manure in the busy 
weeks of spring. 
Keeping Apples. 
As the crop is short, and prices have ruled high, 
it is all the more important to preserve apples in 
the best condition. The main element of success 
is a low and uniform temperature, just above freez¬ 
ing. The house cellar is the farmer’s fruit-room in 
winter, and if properly managed, answers the pur¬ 
pose very perfectly. But there is a great deal of 
carelessness in guarding cellars against extreme 
zero nights, and the apples and vegetables are fre¬ 
quently frozen before the owner suspects any 
danger. Banking the under-pinning with a thick 
mat of leaves, straw, old hay, or evergreen boughs, 
will keep out the frost. These are within reach of 
every farmer, and are easily kept in place with 
boards or poles. But some cellars are very moist, 
and the temperature is likely to be too high rather 
than too low. This can be remedied by having a 
window that can be shut or opened at pleasure. By 
consulting a thermometer, which costs but a trifle, 
it is quite easy to keep the temperature in the cel¬ 
lar between 32 and 40 degrees, which is even 
enough for all practical purposes. The apples 
keep better in barrels, or in 6mall tight packages, 
than in open piles or shelves, because they do not 
feel the changes so soon. For the same reason some 
wrap each apple in paper, or pack them in saw¬ 
dust or land plaster. This requires a considerable 
labor, but nice fresh apples in May and June are 
worth working for. In dry cork sawdust they keep 
sufficiently well without wrappers. If this is not 
available, dry hard-wood sawdust should be used 
in preference to pine or other resinous woods. 
These affect the odor, and sometimes the taste of 
the apples. If no packing is used, the barrels 
should be overhauled once a month, and if any de¬ 
cayed apples are found, they should be carefully 
removed. Keep the barrels Leaded. Look at the 
thermometer every night and morning. If too 
warm, let in more cold air, if too cold, shut the 
window entirely. It takes but a moment to regu¬ 
late the temperature. By this simple process we 
have never failed to keep winter apples in good 
condition until spring. 
-■ — - 
Plantain. —Popular names sometimes deceive 
popular writers. In a late number of the Garden¬ 
ers’ Chronicle the place of honor as the leading 
article is assigned to a long story on the Travels 
of Plants, in which are one or two things hard to 
be understood—such as that “ Alabama aud the 
Gulf states are unsuitable to maize on account of 
their excessive warmth,” and at the close, the fol¬ 
lowing : “ In tropical America Indians named the 
Plantain ‘the Englishman’s Foot,’ a name not in¬ 
appropriately bestowed, since it accompanied him 
to all suitable districts.”—The mention of tropical 
America, and the account which the writer had 
just been giving of “the Plantain and Banana” 
and their dispersion, shows what he had in view. 
But we doubt if the edible Plantain “ accompanied ” 
the Englishman anywhere. Wherever it is, it prob¬ 
ably preceded him. No doubt the writer had some¬ 
where read the familiar statement, which we be¬ 
lieve began with Jocelyn, in “ The Rarities of New 
England,” (1672), that in North America the Indians 
called the Wayside Plantain (Plantago major), “ the 
White Man’s Foot,” because it springs up wherever 
this has trodden. 
